Attack of the Fanboy Top 10 Games of 2017 Staff Lists

The staff here at Attack of the Fanboy has varied tastes. Once a year we get together to come up with our Best Games of the year, but our top-10’s are usually much different than that list. Some of us are Nintendo fans, some play more mainstream titles, and others spend their time wandering through JRPG worlds or other niches that they prefer. Below you’ll find the thoughts of participating staff on the year in general and their top ten games of 2017.

William

For me 2017 started out with a lot of promise and ended with a complete frustration towards the industry in general. On one hand, I got to play a ton of games that I’d been waiting a long time to play — Persona 5, Cuphead, Destiny 2 and many others that didn’t end up in my top 10. As someone who’s been skeptical towards early access, I got my most enjoyment out of two titles that for the better part of the year have been works in progress — PUBG and Dead Cells. I finally bought a Nintendo console that I like, it’s not perfect by any means, but Nintendo has gotten a lot right with the Switch and they’re supporting the hell out of this console.

On the other, the tail end of 2017 and the loot boxes that were being added to almost every single game I’d been looking forward to soured my experience with a lot of my favorite franchises. It was a year where Electronic Arts single handedly made me doubt the future of video games. They basically sent the Mass Effect series out to die with Mass Effect Andromeda. They shuttered a studio that was developing a game that I was very much looking forward to, and they ruined what could have been two strong releases with Need for Speed and Star Wars: Battlefront. I shouldn’t care, but I wanted these games to be good as I’ve gotten a ton of enjoyment from these franchises in the past. As a fan I want them to succeed, but the practices that EA is employing are beyond egregious. Unfortunately, a lot of my pessimism comes from the actions of Electronic Arts this year. Not only because they ruined a handful of highly anticipated games, but because they are an industry leader and usually lead the charge when it comes to trends that are adopted across the board.

I’m not entirely sure things will get better before they get worse, but I’m hopeful that the continued swell of backlash towards anti-consumer practices will push publishers to treat their fanbases with better care.

Kyle

2017 was an odd year for me and video games. It is, without much argument, one of the medium’s finest years. Massive releases were hitting left and right all year long, and most of them actually lived up to the hype. Yet this level of greatness also meant that I couldn’t get around to playing all the games I wanted to, and my list reflects that. Given a few more months I might want to make some changes, but there’s no doubt in my mind that all ten of my favorite games deserve a place on this list, even if there are better titles out there.

Breath of the Wild really kicked the year into high gear, but the fantastic Resident Evil 7 was the one that set the stage for greatness. By year’s end there were at least 3-4 games that in any other year would be easy GOTY winners, but I kept going back to Zelda: Breath of the Wild and being impressed every single time. Super Mario Odyssey was its closest competitor, and it’s truly an amazing game, but the way BOTW reworked open world gaming in new and interesting ways will have a truly lasting impact on games and how I view them.

2017 was an amazing year, full of great gaming experiences. I can only hope that 2018 holds half as many.

Jose

2017 has finally been the year when the current generation of consoles reached the maturity and excellence necessary to stand on its own compared to other eras. Long-running franchises consolidated their power via new entries, brand new AAA productions gave us a glimpse of what could be the big series of the future, and many new surprises helped to re-shape the barriers between major and independent productions.

In the first quarter, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard successfully took the survival horror series to a promising future, also becoming the first fully-realized AAA title for VR platforms, a trend expanded by Farpoint, which actually delivered one of the finest exclusive VR experiences. Horizon: Zero Dawn made Guerrilla Games reach the highest level of excellence among Sony studios, sharing the spotlight with distinguished companies like Naughty Dog. The game has all the chances to become PS4’s most iconic game when we look back at this generation, and Aloy enters the select group of PlayStation iconic heroes, joining Crash Bandicoot, Kratos, or Nathan Drake.

Of course, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was one of the main players in making the Nintendo Switch the company’s new massive hit, providing the console with an instant classic right on launch day. Combined with Splatoon 2 and Super Mario Odyssey, the Switch has gained the hearts of thousands of Nintendo fans like few consoles have done before setting a bright future for the company and the platform.

Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy perhaps will not only be remembered as an excellent platform game on its own, but also for opening the door to a new kind of remake in which companies rebuild the graphic aspects of a game, but avoiding making any gameplay changes that might draw criticism from the fans. Future PS4 releases like Shadow of the Colossus and Medievil will try to consolidate this new concept.

Finally Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice helped opening a breach in the monopoly of AAA games delivered by major companies, marking the start of a new and exciting era for independent developers, that will hopefully bring a lot of variety in terms of franchises.

Jelani

There’s no doubt that 2017 will be a year to remember. Between the Nintendo’s “return” to relevance with the Switch, Sony pumping out hit after hit on the PlayStation 4 and Vita, and Microsoft unleashing the technological beast known as the Xbox One X, there was something for everyone on any console. Hell, there was even stuff for those on PC and mobile.

Seriously, was there ever a time that gamers didn’t have anything to look forward to this year?

As a fan of Japanese games, 2017 featured a veritable cornucopia of games for me to potentially sink my teeth into. Just to name some of the more popular ones, there was Yakuza 0, Tales of Berseria, Nioh, Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana, Persona 5, NieR: Automata, Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Super Mario Odyssey.

Of course, there was a variety of other types of games to enjoy, such as PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, Destiny 2, Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus, Horizon Zero Dawn, Call Of Duty: WWII, Tekken 7, Fire Emblem Heroes, Assassin’s Creed Origins, Sonic Mania and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy.

Honestly, those merely scratch the surface, as there are simply too many games to list.

Of course, with the good comes the bad and there were a few controversies that marred what could have been an impeccable year. To name a few, Nier: Automata was wrapped up in one due to 2B’s outfit, Middle-earth: Shadow of War received a bit of flak concerning microtransactions until EA and Star Wars Battlefront II came and told it to hold their beer, and Xenoblade Chronicles 2 caught some shade due to outfits and alleged sexism.

Even with those controversies in mind, 2017 was easily the strongest year in gaming since (perhaps) 2007 and while I’m definitely optimistic about the future, it’s unlikely to be topped anytime soon.